Like many people in the IT Industry I have worked from home at certain times in my various employment, but how productive was I? More people now have the opportunity to work at home with improved Broadband connectivity and many companies now having VPNs or using Hosted Services, but does it work?With the current issues of increased road congestion, environmental concerns, work life balance and the need for companies to be available more hours it makes sense to move to Home Working. There are problems with the Home Office like the safety angle – if you fall down your stairs during working time who is responsible? Also there are distraction like the daily Australian Soap Opera, visits from your mother, loading the washing machine and watching the Test Match. The truth is though that people have relative short concerntration spans anyway. Most of us can only concentrate on a job for an hour yet at work can end up trying to keep working for four hours at a time stuck in front of our PC answering emails instantly that could often wait. Many of us probably waste 1/4 of our day at work just chatting/gossiping or two hours in a weekly meeting to recap on what was said at the last weekly meeting.I personally feel that at home employees can be productive and will often spend more hours actually working than they do at work. They won’t stop dead on the dot of 5pm and will often work longer to get jobs done. They are also more relaxed, unless of course they have a young child to entertain. How many times have you had to take time off work because the washing machine repair-man is coming or Toby has got chicken-pox? In the office you would be less likely to make the time up but at home there is no excuse why you shouldn’t do an extra hour at night.One draw-back with working from home is the social one. People do like to be with people and to feel they belong to a company. Perhaps the answer is balance and that employees should be allowed to work at home 2 days a week. Of course, then how would you be able to follow the Australian Soap Opera?

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